Does it seem odd to you that your beliefs have been so dependent on the writings of two reformed theologians from 500 years ago ? A 1500 year gap and you don't see the red flag ? The behavior of john Calvin and you don't notice the problem ? Have you noticed how many continue to seek a new movement, denomination, sect, or system to make their Christian experience genuine ? Do you really believe there was a divine intervention of confusion 500 years ago ? If so, why not go back and be a genuine Calvinist ? Oh, Calvin tried and failed at that in Geneva already.
I don’t depend on anyone living 500 years ago for my understanding. I had believed the Doctrines of Grace for 10 years before I read the first word of Calvin and to this day I’ve never spent much time reading either Calvin or Luther. The more I studied the Scriptures, the more I saw God’s sovereignty. I was convicted over sovereignty by the plain reading of the Word of God, initially the Gospel of John, not anyone’s system. I simply can’t read John or Paul without seeing God as sovereign over all things, including the salvation of sinners. At the same time I see virtually no evidence for “free will.” Instead I read of a will that has been a slave to sin.
God bless, FRiend!
As a bonus here are some instructive quotes from Charles Spurgeon. I give them not because I get my doctrine from them, but because I’m in agreement with them. I’m also posting them because I just plain like them.
“It is no novelty, then, that I am preaching; no new doctrine. I love to proclaim these strong old doctrines that are called by nickname Calvinism, but which are truly and verily the revealed truth of God as it is in Christ Jesus.”
“I have my own opinion that there is no such thing as preaching Christ and Him crucified, unless we preach what nowadays is called Calvinism. It is a nickname to call it Calvinism; Calvinism is the gospel, and nothing else. I do not believe we can preach the gospel if we do not preach justification by faith without works; nor unless we preach the sovereignty of God in His dispensation of grace; nor unless we exalt the electing unchangeable eternal, immutable, conquering love of Jehovah; nor do I think we can preach the gospel unless we base it upon the special and particular redemption of His elect and chosen people which Christ wrought out upon the cross. (Charles Spurgeon, The New Park Street Pulpit, Vol. 1, 1856).”
“... and I will go as far as Martin Luther, in that strong assertion of his, where he says, ‘If any man doth ascribe of salvation, even the very least, to the free will of man, he knoweth nothing of grace, and he hath not learnt Jesus Christ aright.’ It may seem a harsh sentiment; but he who in his soul believes that man does of his own free will turn to God, cannot have been taught of God, for that is one of the first principles taught us when God begins with us, that we have neither will nor power, but that He gives both; that he is ‘Alpha and Omega’ in the salvation of men. (C.H. Spurgeon from the sermon “Free Will A Slave”, 1855).”
When I was coming to Christ, I thought I was doing it all myself, and though I sought the Lord earnestly, I had no idea the Lord was seeking me. I do not think the young convert is at first aware of this. I can recall the very day and hour when first I received those truths in my own soul - when they were as John Bunyan says, burnt into my heart as with a hot iron; and I can recollect how I felt that I had grown all of a sudden from a babe into a man - that I had made progress in scriptural knowledge, through having found, once for all, the clue to the truth of God ... I saw that God was at the bottom of it all, and that He was the Author of my faith, and so the whole doctrine of grace opened up to me, and from that doctrine I have not departed to this day, and I desire to make this my constant confession, I ascribe my change wholly to God. (Charles Spurgeon, Autobiography: 1, The Early Years, Banner of Truth, pp. 164-165).
Calvinism did not spring from Calvin. We believe that it sprang from the great Founder of all truth. (Charles Spurgeon, Sermons, Vol. 7, p. 298).
We declare on scriptural authority that the human will is so desperately set on mischief, so depraved, so inclined to everything that is evil, and so disinclined to everything that is good, that without the powerful, supernatural, irresistible influence of the Holy Spirit, no human will ever be constrained toward Christ. (Charles Spurgeon, Sermons, Vol. 4, p.139).
I do not come into this pulpit hoping that perhaps somebody will of his own free will return to Christ. My hope lies in another quarter. I hope that my Master will lay hold of some of them and say, “You are mine, and you shall be mine. I claim you for myself.” My hope arises from the freeness of grace, and not from the freedom of the will.
I believe that Christ came into the world not to put men into a salvable state, but into a saved state. Not to put them where they could save themselves, but to do the work in them and for them, from first to last. If I did not believe that there was might going forth with the word of Jesus which makes men willing, and which turns them from the error of their ways by the mighty, overwhelming, constraining force of divine influence, I should cease to glory in the cross of Christ. (C.H. Spurgeon, Sermons, Vol. 3, p. 34).
A man is not saved against his will, but he is made willing by the operation of the Holy Ghost. A mighty grace which he does not wish to resist enters into the man, disarms him, makes a new creature of him, and he is saved. (C.H. Spurgeon, Sermons, Vol. 10, p. 309).
I question whether we have preached the whole counsel of God, unless predestination with all its solemnity and sureness be continually declared. (Charles Spurgeon, Sermons, Vol. 6, p. 26).